Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1887-05-23
THE NEW THEORY
Ot the Formation of Gas and Oil-Pre.
fessrr Vail deliberately Explains
How They Come to Exist.
Deuosited while Nest of tho Continent Was
Under the SeR-Carried Upon Polar
Current with the Gulf Stream.
Cincinnati Enquirer.


western OHIO in relation to the oil and gas
formations, made reference to the fact
that Prof. l. n. Vail, in recent work,
"sToRY OF THE ROCKS"
mad given tie only logical scientific theory
accounting therefor.
nave had very interesting converse
ton with him on this subject, which will
not only strike the attention of scientists,
mt excite the interest of all classes in
Northwest and Southwest Ohio, Indiana,
NorfherH Illinois and Southwest Mich.
igsn.
"Wll you favor the Enquirer with your
views in relation to the oil and gas de-
nosits?" l asked Prof. Vail.
an the STORY of the Rocks, in single
paragraph, to which you made reference
in one of your recent articles from North
west Ohio, gave the key, which accord
ING to the Annular Theory, may lead the
student to understand this great problem
& little better, and it is only with the hope
t9st it may render such aid that | now
offer what l have to say"
what is natural gas, to begin With"
"Hydro-caEbor; and it is desirable first
TO know
THE ORIGIN
of this lydro-Carbon. During the last
few months biologists have been per
picked and startled by unexpected de
velopments, and there are many things
which even the new theory cannot at this
stage attempt to explain. The noble
science of geology ought no. to be
charged that it has never filed g tank,
snd vet il is none the less true that blind
chance has directed the drillers' efforts
aud found wealth where the biologists
least expected TO find it, and the mass of
the people are led 10 suspect that science
itself is at fault"
"Have recent developments sustained
your theory"
GAS I look over the wide field l can
plainly see that all things combine and
are combining to prove the truth Of that
theory which | advanced years ago. The
geologist will not expect to be told that
he must abandon the claim that oil and
g2s are the
PRODUCE or ORGANIC NATTER,
and some OF them, when they listen TO
me that far, win exclaim that they have
enough of the new theory"
"Enen they do not result from organic
mattar?"
Oh limited quantities, yes, but no
further. The distillatiOn which gives
rise - hvdrOC8rbon from organic matter
is plainly that Of miniature smelling
furnace. The process 10y which the car
bon and hydrogen elements are dissO-
eisted in the fossil bed is precisely the
same, except in degree OF energy, as that
which takes place in any other furnace.
q - IN lh hot
tent distillatIOn autedated ell organic
sources OF hydro-carbon, then due cred
enCe must be given TO the claim that
animal and vegetable forms can, at most,
supply but a secondary and limited
amount. Biologists everywhere ADMIT
that for
COUNTLESS AND JNCOUNTABLE AGES
the earth was great smelling furnace,
and must have distilled the very same
products from the earth's mineral fund as
now can and may be distilled from the or
gsnic fund. The geology of to-day takes
the rock, with its fossil organisms there
in, and by distilling process extracts
the Carbons therefrOm. The Annular
Theory takes the rock containing its min
eraI carbon, before an animal or plant
lived on the earth, subjects it to the dis
filling process of the igueOus eye and eX-
tracts its carbon theTefrom. This was
the original and primitive process, with
out which even the plant or the animal
could not have obtained CARBON as food,
and without which organisms could not
have been q competent source of hydro
carbon.
':And the interenCes?"
"The vegetable could never have sup
piled carbon in any form if this primitive
distiIation had not taken place, and this
primitive distinatiOn is the same TO all
intents and purposes as that which is
claimed in the decay of the animal and
plant. Then the organic process is q sec
ondary one in every sense. Now, sub
nit whether it is either reasonable or
philOsOphic to claim that
THE SECOND PROCESS
is the more adequate one? Can it be
possible that the organic, or secondary,
process has done and is doing all the
work. CsE it be possible that the
primitive furnace has done none of it,"
II should prefer your answer, to the
questions -
"There is, to my mind, no proposition
more self-evident than the claim that
every destructive distillation from the
deCaying organism of the plant or animal
through every gas retort or smelling
furnace to the earth in the sun-state has
produced and still produces the carbon
forms just IN proportion to the capacity
of the furnace. Now we cannot pretend
to measure the capacity of the great
telluric furnace, but we know that an
unreasonable fund of carbon was in
volyed in its primitive fires. There is no
uncertainty in this. We are forced then
to the Irresistible logic Of facts to admit
that sRimmeasurable fund of allotropic
carbofSeame torth from the infant earth,
lust as they do to-day from every fire
place and peat mash on the planet"
.'Wen, what became OF these com
pounds?"
owe know that they must be found
somewhere in the esrth's crust. They
cannot be dlssipsted and lost eny more
than the graphite, asphaltic and other
RESIDUAL COMPOUNDS
of tGc gas retoTt. 1t must, therefore,
strike any intelligent thinker that some
where, locked up IN the earth's crust, are
70 be found cartoons and hydro carbons,
gathered in the igleOus ages from the
innermost depths OF the earth. This
thought is the key to the origin of pc
roleum and natural gas, as given in The
STORY Of the Rocks, page 352."
"Then they are independent of organic
supply"
alt is perfectly plain that there must be
p rho oor+b q II tho residual 1rpduptc Of a |